Review of Retieu-s, 2/7/06. 



THE BOOK OF THE MONTH. 



"THE OTHER SIDE OF DEATH 



"If a man dies, shall he live again?" The air 

 resounds with disputes as to the teaching of religion 

 in our schools. May I suggest that it might perhaps 

 not be unprofitable if some of our doughty dispu- 

 tants would devote a little attention to the question 

 whether, if the State has to undertake the religious 

 instruction of our children, what answer is to be 

 given to the fundamental question as to the immor- 

 tality of the soul ? 



AX IMPORTANT QUESTION. 



Undenominational religion, simple Bible teaching, 

 unsectarianism, non-dogmatic teaching — all these 

 phrases will not avail to obscure the issue. Possibly 

 before the Education Bill gets through the Com- 

 mittee stage, Mr. Birrell--or, failing him, perhaps 

 Mr. Thomas Lough- -might inform Parliament whe- 

 ther or not the Education Department is prepared to 

 express an opinion upon this all important subject. 

 Is' the immortality of the soul .to be taught as a 

 dogma or as a hypothesis, or is it to be left as an 

 open question? Bishop Gore has laid down the law 

 very emphatically as to the absolute necessity for 

 explicit dogmatic teaching in our public elementary 

 schools. But unfortunately Bishop Gore's idea of 

 what should be taught as dogmatic truth on this 

 subject would not be accepted as true by either the 

 Countv Council, the Education Department, or the 

 House of Commons. This I say assuming that the 

 Bishop stands by the Apostles' Creed, which is ex- 

 plicit, dogmatic and authoritative enough, but whxh 

 unfortunately on the subject now under discussion 

 makes an explicit, dogmatic and authoritative state- 

 ment which in its plain literal sense is absolutely un- 

 believable by any human being. " I believe," says 

 the Apostles' Creed, " in the Resurrection of the 

 Body." But in reality no one believes any such 

 thing, if by Body the only body we have ever seen, 

 the physical, body be meant. Those who pretend 

 to believe it do so by dint of explanations and eluci- 

 dations which may be commended as eminently illus- 

 trative of the kind of evasive, illusive, indeter- 

 minate teaching which the Denominationalists so 

 vehemently decry. They are certainly the very re- 

 verse of the clear, simple, positive statements which 

 they assure us the child requires. 



* 1. "Tlie other Side of Death: Scientifically examined 

 and rarefull.v described." By 0. W. Leadbeater. Theo- 

 sophical Publishiue Co. 



2. " Interwoven. Letters from a Son to his Mother." 

 Boston: G. H. Ellis Co., 272 Congress-street. 



3. "The Communion of Sainta." By Eev. P. Dearmer. 

 The Commonwealth. 



4. " The Soul in Science and Religion." By Dr. Paul 

 Oarus. The llonist. 



BY VARIOUS EXPLORERS. 



I 



WANTED A EEPLY! 



We do not think there would be any difficulty in 

 procuring a negative vote from the House of Com- i 

 mons or from the National Union of Elementary 

 Teachers on the subject of the Resurrection of the 

 Body. That ancient method of expressing the doc- 

 trine of personal immortality could hardly be recom- 

 mended, even by Lord Hugh Cecil, as a simple 

 concrete statement of dogmatic truth. What is 

 wanted is not a negative but a positive decision. We 

 all agree that no man in his senses w^ould deliberately 

 teach any class of children the Resurrection of the 

 physical Body as a literal truth, any more than he 

 would teach them that the world was made 4000 

 years before Christ in six days of twenty-four hours 

 each. Our forefathers no doubt believed both state- 

 ments, as they believed many other things which 

 have become simply incredible to us. But what axe 

 the teachers, now to be emancipated from all manner 

 of religious tests, to teach as to the Life after Death? 

 Is there another side to Death, or is there not? 

 When a man dies, does he die like the beast that 

 perisheth, or does he live again as a persistent per- 

 sonality in another state of existence? Does con- 

 scious personality survive Death, or is it merged 

 in the common universal soul, as a drop is merged 

 in the ocean? Is it true that to all men cometh 

 Death, and after Death the Judgment? If a teacher 

 were to deny the existence of the soul, and to confine 

 his tuition to enforcing the very negative views of 

 many of the writers of the Old Testament, would 

 the Education authorities interfere ? " These be 

 questions " to which answers should be forthcoming. 



THE POPULAR CATHOLIC BELIEF. 



The popular teaching of the Roman Catholic 

 Church is at least clear and explicit. The last time 

 I attended service in a Roman Catholic Cathedral 

 I heard it set forth with much strenuous fervour and 

 vigorous elo]uence by the priest who occupied the 

 pulpit. It was at Thurles, where I was on a visit 

 to that dear old Irish saint, Archbishop Croke. The 

 preacher told the crowded congregation that if any 

 of them had abstained that morning from attending 

 Mass excepting under the constraint of circumstances 

 over which they had no control, or for some good and 

 sufficient reason, they were living in mortal sin. If 

 any of them were to be smitten down by death be 

 fore that sin was repented of and confessed, the sin 

 ners would at once pass into the flames of hell, there 

 to suffer till all eternity the constantly renewed tor- 

 ture of the worm that dieth not and of the fire that 

 bums with inextinguishable flame. That night after 

 church I frankly expressed to Dr. Croke my amaze- 

 ment at hearing; such daiimablv inhuman doctrine 



